


Frozen

by procellous



Series: Here Our Dreams Are [1]
Category: Robin (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - Snow Queen Fusion, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-26
Updated: 2013-12-26
Packaged: 2018-01-06 03:52:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1102081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/procellous/pseuds/procellous
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No matter how long it takes, no matter how far I have to travel, I will come for you and I will always love you.</p><p>(Tim/Steph Snow Queen AU)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Frozen

**Author's Note:**

> A retelling of Hans Christian Andersen's The Snow Queen.
> 
> I tried to mimic his style as much as possible, so it doesn't sound like the rest of my stories. You can find the original story here: http://www.online-literature.com/hans_christian_andersen/972/

Once upon a time, in a city called Gotham, an evil and cruel man simply called the Joker fashioned a mirror, and in that mirror anything good and beautiful looked hideous and ugly, and anything mean or gruesome appeared to be gorgeous and appealing, for the Joker knew magic, and he thought this was good fun. He ran up and down the streets of Gotham laughing at his clever joke.

But there was a storm in Gotham that day, and the wind picked up the mirror and dashed it to pieces; and its magic worked even more horribly than before for now each piece was small, some no larger than a grain of sand and the wind scattered it all across the city. And when the Joker realized this, he laughed until he cried, for the chaos now spread across Gotham was dreadfully amusing to the man, and so he laughed all the way to his little house, and laughed all the rest of his life.

As for the pieces, some were found and cleaned and used for the lenses of glasses and such, but many more struck the people in the eye and turned all they saw into the opposite of what they were, and some of the splinters got into people's hearts, and froze them cold as ice.

We shall find out what happened to two of the pieces now, for they are what this story concerns.

* * *

Now, in the city of Gotham, there are many houses very close together indeed, and many of these houses do not have enough room for gardens, and unfortunately many of the people who live in this city would not care to have a garden at all.

But in two of these houses, there lived a girl named Stephanie in one, and in the other a boy named Tim, and they would frequently meet each other on the roof-top where their houses met. These two were the best of friends and very dear to each other, and together they grew a little rose-bush on their roof. And all the birds in Gotham would flock to their little rose-bush, and there were two robins who had built a nest on one of the roof-tops in the city and often came to the little rose bush.

But as winter came to the city they could not meet each other on the roof-tops and so had to go all the way around, bundling up and walking to the other's door and back again instead of the wonderfully short trip up to the roof-tops, and out-of doors there was a terrible snowstorm.

"It is the white bees swarming," Tim's grandfather, an elderly man named Alfred, had said when the storm came.

"Do the white bees choose a queen like other bees?" Tim had asked, and his grandfather had replied that they did, she was where the swarm was thickest, for she could never stay upon the ground, but only look in through windows, and the windows would freeze in wondrous patterns, like flowers.

"Can the Queen come inside?" Stephanie had asked.

"Let her come!" Tim declared. "I'll put her on the stove and she'll melt!"

Then his grandfather had patted him on the head and told him other stories.

* * *

Days passed, then weeks, and winter turned into spring, and all the snow melted and the two friends could again meet upon the roof-tops, and spring turned into summer with long humid days and short balmy nights.

One day, up on their roof-top, with the two robins chirping in their rose-bush, Tim suddenly cried out.

“What’s wrong?” Stephanie asked, worried, “Are you hurt?”

“Something has got into my eye, and I felt such a great pain in my heart!” Stephanie put her arms around him, and he winked his eye, and the pain vanished as if it had never been, and he declared, “See! I have gotten it out,” and Stephanie met his eyes and there was nothing in it.

Of course, he had been hit by two of the pieces of the magic mirror, one of the splinters in his eye and the other in his heart. Now he looked about the rooftop as though he had never seen it before, and it looked to him terrible and ugly: the roses appeared to him wilted and rotten, the robins in the bush were frightfully hideous, even sweet little Stephanie appeared to be ugly and malformed.

Appalled at the ugliness of his surroundings, he began to pluck the roses from their bush, ripping the leaves off and tearing the petals, and Stephanie became so frightened that she ran up to him and grabbed him about the waist and held his hands so that they could not hurt the little bush or the robins, but he pushed away from her grasp and raced inside of his house, and that was the end of that.

As the days passed, little Tim, who was so kind and well-behaved that everyone loved him dearly, became a horrid, ill-behaved, and rude little boy, who would pull at Stephanie's pigtails whenever she came to visit him and whenever his grandfather told him stories, would interrupt and if he could would stand behind the elderly man and imitate him, even stealing his glasses and wearing them to better mock him.

Soon he would imitate everyone on the street, everything that was unpleasant or odd about them, he could imitate, and all the people said he was a very clever boy for doing so, but it was the glass in his eye and heart that caused him to act so.

And throughout the whole year, Tim's games became crueler and meaner, and he would tease Stephanie terribly – gentle, sweet little Stephanie, whose heart and soul were devoted to him – until she could hardly bear to be around him.

In time, summer turned to fall and winter; and the snow came and the robins in the rosebush flew away.

Now, the bigger boys in Gotham had a delightful little game during the winter: they would go out into the square with their sleds, and hitch them to a cart and ride along behind the cart for a time before untying themselves, and thus they amused themselves.

Little Tim had gone out into the square with them one winters day, and hitched his little sled to the largest and grandest sledge he could find, and it was a most wondrous sledge: it was all white and silver, with a rider all bundled up in fur, so that their face was not visible, and it was even pulled by two great reindeer. And the rider had nodded towards Tim as though they were old friends as he hitched his little sled to their larger one and off they went. They went so very very fast that Tim became frightened, but every time he thought to untie his little sled the rider would turn around and give him a nod, and Tim sat back down, and so on until they were out of the city. The snow began to fall as they rode on, thicker and thicker until Tim could scarcely see a handbredth in front of him, and he began to cry out in fear, but no-one heard him. After some time, the snowflakes grew larger and larger until they were the size of chickens, and seemed to dance before him, and he forgot his fear and laughed. The sledge soon stopped by a wood, and the rider stood, revealing itself: a woman, tall, thin and beautiful, whose skin was a white as the snow around them. She was the Snow Queen.

"We have travelled fast," said she, "and it is cold for a young boy such as you. Come up here with me under my bearskin, it is warm here." And he came up to the sledge and she sat him down next to her under the furs, and kissed him on the forehead. It was freezing cold, as cold as the ice in his heart, but after a time the cold around him no longer bothered him, and the snowy landscape felt quite congenial. Then she kissed him again, and he forgot all about little Stephanie and his grandfather back home.

Tim looked at her. She was very beautiful; a more clever, or a more lovely face he could not imagine; in his eyes she was perfect, he did not fear her at all, though he should. She snapped the reins, and the deer pulling the sledge took off again, flying across the snow.

* * *

Now, where is Stephanie through all this?

Back in Gotham, little Stephanie missed her friend terribly, and asked everyone if they had seen him, but all they would say was that they had seen Tim hitch his sled to a sledge and ride out of town; what else may have happened to him, they did not know. For the rest of the winter, she mourned, certain that her friend had fallen into the river that flowed just outside of town.

"Tim is dead and gone," she cried, all through the long winter evenings.

But in time spring came, and with it the two robins, and the roses on their rose-bush bloomed again.

"Tim is dead and gone," Stephanie cried to the robins.

"That I don't believe," came the reply of the first one.

"Tim is dead and gone," she cried again, and this time the second one answered her, "That I don't believe."

That time she believed the robins, and one fine morning decided to find him; she put on her purple shoes, that Tim had never seen, and set off for the river that flowed just outside of town.

"Is it true you have taken my playmate? I will make you a present of my shoes if you will give him back to me!" she called into the river.

And the waves seemed to nod to her, and so she took off her pretty purple shoes, the most precious things she owned, and threw them into the river, but they bobbed back to her, for the river did not have her friend and so would not take her gift. But she thought that she had not thrown them in far enough, and so she climbed into a boat that lay among the rushes and pushed out to the deepest part and threw her shoes into the water, but the river would not take her precious shoes and tried to return them to her. The boat was not tied up, though, and as the river tried to return her shoes, the boat drifted off downstream, her shoes bobbing along behind her. Frightened, sitting in the small boat alone and shoeless, Stephanie began to cry, and the two little robins began to sing as they flew alongside her to comfort her.

"Perhaps the river will carry me to Tim," she thought, and was less sad. She watched the banks travel by, and presently the river slowed considerably and became much wider and more peaceful. She fell asleep as the sun was beginning to set, and when she woke the first rays of dawn were peeking over the horizon like the red and pink roses on the little roof-top, and she wept for home. As she drifted, she saw a cottage ahead, and called out for help.

A woman came out of the cottage, carrying a long hooked staff, and fished Stephanie out of the river, the hook catching on the prow of the little boat she traveled on, and then helped her out of the boat and onto dry land. The woman had long red hair and wore a very pretty green dress, patterned with painted flowers, and Stephanie asked her if she, perhaps, had seen little Tim.

"You poor dear," came the reply, "I have not seen your playmate, but I am sure he will come by. Come inside, have some cherries. Your friend will come." She took Stephanie by the hand and lead her into the cottage and locked the door behind her. "Now then, why don't you tell me everything that has happened, while we wait?"

And so Stephanie told the woman everything, about their rose-bush and their little robins, and how Tim had began to act strangely. As she spoke, the woman stroked her golden curls comfortingly.

"I have lived here for many years, Stephanie, all alone, but I think you and I will become like mother and daughter." The woman stopped stroking her hair and began to braid it prettily; and as she braided, Stephanie forgot all about Tim and his grandfather, and her worry and sorrow. The woman was not an evil woman, and though she understood magic, only used it for her own amusement, and very much wished Stephanie were her own daughter. Thereupon she quietly told the roses in her garden to retreat into the earth, afraid that should the little girl see them, remember her home and her dear Tim.

Then she lead Stephanie into the garden and showed her all the colorful flowers of every type and season, all blooming together in a colorful medley. Stephanie played there for a time, and she found every flower she could name and many more besides, but there was one flower missing that she could not quite place. She spent many hours puzzling over which flower was wanting, and it wasn't until she looked at the woman's pretty dress and thought that the most beautiful seemed to be the rose that she realized it was the that roses were not in the garden.

"Are there no roses here!" she said, and searched and searched, but could not find them. She knelt by a flowerbed and she wept. As she cried, her hot tears fell upon the earth, and the roses sprang up, and she was so overjoyed that she hugged the bush and did not mind the pricks of the thorns.

"Oh, I have meant to look for Tim, but I have spent so long here instead. Do you think he is dead and gone?" she asked the roses.

"Dead and gone he is not," they replied, "For we have been in the earth where the dead things are, and did not see him."

"Oh, thank you," she cried, embracing the rose-bush once again. "Do any of you know where he might be?" she asked the other flowers in their beds.  But every flower dreamed its own fairy tale or its own story: and they all told her very many things, but not one knew anything of Tim. And so Stephanie ran to the other end of the garden, and tried to open the gate, but it was locked.

She shook the gate until the rusted latch came loose, and she raced out, barefoot, into the wide world.

After a time, she paused, and looked about her, and it was autumn: she had spent the spring and summer away in the garden where there is always sunshine. Determined to find Tim, she vowed she would not rest until she found him.

* * *

Stephanie had to rest again soon, however, for traveling barefoot in autumn is tiring and cold, when a raven hopped down next to her.

"Caw! Caw!" it said, "Good day! Good day! Why are you traveling all alone?"

His speech was croaky and hard to understand, but "alone" Stephanie understood well, and told him her story, asking if perhaps he had seen Tim.

"I may have, I may have. I think I know; I think that it may be little Kay. But now he has forgotten you for the Princess."  
  
"Does he live with a Princess?" asked Stephanie.  
  
"Yes--listen," said the Raven; "but it will be difficult for me to speak your language. If you understand the Raven language I can tell you better."  
  
"No, I have not learnt it," said Stephanie, "But now I wish I had."

"No matter, no matter. I shall tell it to you in your language." And he told her all he knew:

"In the kingdom we are in now, there lives a Princess who is extraordinarily clever; for she has read all the books in the whole world, and has not forgotten them again, so clever is she. She was lately, it is said, sitting on her throne, which is not very amusing after all, when she began humming an old tune, and it was just, 'Oh, why should I not be married?' "That song is not without its meaning,' said she, and so then she was determined to marry; but she would have a husband who knew how to give an answer when he was spoken to, not merely one who looked only as if he were a great personage, for that is so tiresome. She then had all the ladies of the court drummed together; and when they heard her intention, all were very pleased, and said, 'We are very glad to hear it; it is the very thing we were thinking of.' You may believe every word I say," said the Raven; "for I have a tame sweetheart that hops about in the palace quite free, and it was she who told me all this.

"The newspapers appeared forthwith with a border of hearts and the initials of the Princess; and therein you might read that every good-looking young man was at liberty to come to the palace and speak to the Princess; and the one who was as clever as the Princess would be her husband.  
  
"Yes, Yes," said the Raven, "you may believe it; it is true. People came in crowds, but no one was successful either on the first or second day. They could all talk well enough when they were out in the street; but as soon as they came inside the palace gates, and saw the guard richly dressed in silver, and the lackeys in gold on the staircase, and the large illuminated saloons, then they were shy; and when they stood before the throne on which the Princess was sitting, all they could do was to repeat the last word they had uttered, and to hear it again did not interest her very much. It was just as if the people within were under a charm, and had fallen into a trance till they came out again into the street; for then they could chatter enough. There was a whole row of them standing from the town-gates to the palace. I was there myself to look," said the Raven.

"Oh, but what of Tim? Was he there?"

"Patience, patience, I am getting to him. Now, on the third day, there came a little boy, with bright eyes and long dark hair, who walked boldly up to the palace alone."

"That was Tim! I've found him!"

"He had a little knapsack on his back–"

"His sled, it must be!"

"It may well have been, I learned of this from my sweetheart, I was not there when he came. Now then, the boy went up to the Princess, and spoke to her, as well as I could speak in the Raven language; but he was not there to woo the Princess, but hear her wisdom, and they spoke for many hours."

"Could you take me to the palace? Oh, please, Mister Raven, won't you take me there? I must find Tim."

"I shall have to speak to my sweetheart about it, for you are young and barefoot, and the guards will not let you in; but wait here and I will come with my sweetheart and bring you inside."

Thus little Stephanie waited while the Raven flew off inside the palace, and did not return until it was late and the sun beginning to set. But arrive he did, he and his sweetheart, whom he had told all about poor Stephanie's plight.

"Here is a roll for you, my dear," said the Raven's sweetheart, "For you must be hungry after your long journey. Now the guards will not let you in the front, that is true, but there is a secret staircase in back, and through it we shall enter the palace and find your sweetheart."

And they went into the garden in the large avenue, where one leaf was falling after the other; and when the lights in the palace had all gradually disappeared, the Ravens led little Stephanie to the back door, which stood half open.

"Now, take this lantern," said the Raven's sweetheart, "And I will go before you, to lead the way."

The tame Raven lead Stephanie through the palace, and in the first room they peeped into there were two beds, one which held the Princess, and the other a sleeping man, who looked to Stephanie very much like her dear Tim, and so called out to him. He awoke, but alas, it was not little Tim. The Prince resembled him in neck and hair, but not at all in body. The Princess, too, awoke, and - oh! the Ravens had not mentioned her beauty, her red hair curled about her face, and her green eyes seemed to know everything – asked what the matter was. Little Stephanie began to cry as she told her whole story, and what the Ravens had done for her.

"Poor little thing," said the Prince and Princess, and they praised the Ravens for helping the girl. The Princess gave her a key, and told her that there was a room she could sleep in for the night, and the Prince showed her where it was.

"How good are men and animals!" she thought as she lay in the soft bed, and she slept.

In the morning, when she awoke, she dressed in fine silks and velvet, and spoke with the Princess about little Tim, and the Princess told her that Tim had gone north. Since Stephanie was determined to find her dear friend, the Princess, who told her to call her Barbara, for that was her name, and the Prince, who also told her to call him by his name, Richard, gave her a carriage all made of gold and filled with good things to eat, and had their coat of arms on it. The Princess also gave her a fine purple cape, all lined with fur, for she would be traveling north, where it was very cold.

* * *

As the gold carriage travelled through the woods, a gang of outlaws saw it, for it shone like the sun itself.

"'Tis gold! 'Tis gold!" two of them cried, a red-haired man and woman, and they pushed the driver away, and grabbed little Stephanie from inside.

Their leader, a man taller than the Prince had been and broader besides, with a lock of white shining in his dark hair, held a curved knife to Stephanie's throat, and though she was frightened, she did not weep.

"These woods are dangerous for little girls to be traveling all alone," he said, and his voice was smooth and gentle. "Why were you journeying through the woods, little girl?"

"I am looking for my friend, and he went north, and so I, too, will go north."

"If you are going north, then you will need this pretty cape to keep you warm and something to ride. Now, we are going south ourselves, and carriages are better to ride than reindeer in the south. And because we are fair men and woman, in exchange for your carriage we shall give you our reindeer." He cut the tether of one of their reindeer with his curved knife and lifted little Stephanie up on the reindeer's back. "Now go, and good luck to you."

* * *

The reindeer flew over the snow he ran so fast, with little Stephanie on his back, and she told him of her travels.

"Ddsa! Ddsa!" he said, "If you are looking for little Tim, I have seen him; he rides in the Snow Queen's sledge, curled up at her feet, all blue from cold."

"Where does she live, where is she taking Tim?" Stephanie implored the reindeer. "Oh, I do hope he will be alright!"

"She lives in Lapland, where there is snow and ice all year. Look! There are the Northern Lights!" The lights gleamed like colorful flames dancing across the sky, and the reindeer ran even faster across the snow, day and night he raced on.

Suddenly they stopped at a little cottage. Poor little Stephanie was so cold she could not speak; the reindeer knocked his hoof against a little stone that stood by the doorway and a woman stepped out. She was black haired and silent as she helped the half-frozen girl off of the reindeer's back.

The reindeer told her Stephanie's story, but first his own, for that seemed more important to him, and the woman nodded wisely, and brought little Stephanie inside and sat her by the fire.

"You have far to go," she said, "Snow Queen lives many miles north. Tell Finland woman I said to help you." Her speech was slow, for she did not speak human tongues well, but Stephanie understood her and nodded, and sat by the fire while the Lapland woman gave her food and drink. Once she had fed and rested, she left the Lapland woman and journeyed further north to the Finland woman. 

The reindeer ran for the whole night, and half of the next day, until the arrived at the house of the Finland woman. This time Stephanie knocked at her door, and the Finland woman stepped out; she led Stephanie inside and listened as Stephanie told her story. 

"You are clever," the reindeer said, leaning in through the window, for it was too small inside for him, "I know you can tie up all the winds into a knotted string, and should a man loose one knot, then he has a good wind; if a second, then it blows hard; if he undoes the third and fourth, then it rages so that the forests are upturned. Will you give the little girl a potion, that she may possess the strength of twelve men, and vanquish the Snow Queen?"

"The strength of twelve men? What good would that do? No, the strength of twelve men would not save Tim, it would do no good. Now, little Tim is at the Snow Queen's palace, 'tis true, and finds everything quite to his taste, but that is because he has a splinter of glass in his eye and heart, and these must be got out first, else he shall never be saved."

"But can you not give her something, to increase her strength? How shall she get these shards out of her dear friend?"

"I can give her nothing she does not already have, do you not see that she does not need the strength of men, whether one or one hundred, when she has the strength of a little girl? She travels through this cruel cold world alone and barefoot, and all she meets help her, for she is sweet and good. Now, the Snow Queen's palace is only a mile hence, Stephanie must make the journey there alone. Farewell, and the best of luck to you, Stephanie," the Finland woman said, kissing the forehead of little Stephanie, and sent her onward.

* * *

Now, Tim sat in the palace of the Snow Queen, and did not think of Stephanie or his dear grandfather, but only traced equations in the snow. He was all black and blue from cold, but regarded it not, for the kiss from the Snow Queen had driven it all away. He was quite content to sit there in the snow, tracing equations. He was trying to find the equation that would solve any problem, but could not, and so he puzzled over it. 

He was so still as he puzzled over these equations, only moving his hand, that one might have supposed he was frozen to death, and nearly dead he was, when little Stephanie burst into the palace. She ran to her dear friend, and threw her arms around him, crying for joy, but Tim merely sat there, hardly noticing her embrace. Then she cried for sorrow, and wept bitterly, for she thought her friend dead, but her hot tears fell upon his heart, and thawed away the ice. 

Then Tim, too, joined in with weeping, and as he wept, the shard of glass slipped from his eye, and he recognized little Stephanie, and kissed her deeply.

"Let us go home, Tim," she said; and away they went, back to the Finland woman's house, and from there to the Lapland woman's house, and then they met the outlaws again in the woods, who had traveled south for a time before deciding that the south did not suit them and were about to travel east. They visited the Prince and Princess, who were now wed and quite happy together, and then the two made their way back home to Gotham and Tim's dear grandfather and their rosebush and robins. 

And they lived there for all their days, and were quite happy.

 


End file.
